Friday, 28 March 2014

WoC have quite a lot of Special choices, but one thing that I think stand out with WoC's special choices is how many different unit types you have, you have chariots like the Gorebeast and Warshrine (kind of), monsters like Chimeras, really heavy troops in the Chosen, really fast cavalry with the Hellstriders, Chaos Knights, monstrous infantry with the Trolls and Ogres and even Monstrous Beasts in the Dragon Ogres. So that's almost all the units types you can have just in the Special's.

Sadly a lot things are much better than others, but as WoC is a really tough army as it is you can take any of these and still win a lot of games. I have models for all of the Special choices but I have't painted up so much yet. But here's what Iv'e got painted so far.

Chimera

First of the things I painted in the army was this guy. I actually really like the sculpt (many people do not) but I will convert my second one when I start on him. I went with a mostly light blue on this guy and some transitions to other colours on two of the heads. In the end I like how he turned out.

Gorebeast Chariot of Nurgle
I painted this guy for a long time, mainly due the fact I didn't know how to keep him blue but also look like a follower of Nurgle. In the end he looks like this, quite happy with the result but may redo some of the rust etc.

Chaos Trolls
Trolls is awesome in this edition and the Chaos Trolls in no exception, especially not when Throgg is around as well. So I have to do a big unit of these monsters, and at first I will do a unit of twelve. I'm not there yet but some of them is finished and I have the rest of the troll models (mostly River Troll models) just need to build, convert and paint the rest. Which is no small task as I want to take my time on each of these lovely models.

Dragon Ogres

The new Dragon Ogre models was one of the best looking units in the last WoC release, so I just had to get them. Waited quite a while before I started to paint one of them but I'm happy with the end result. Just one models is finished so far but there will be at least three when this unit is done.

Chaos Ogres
Sadly no popular choice despite them not actually being that bad. I bought eight Irongut models that I want to convert a little and paint up as Chaos Ogres. I choose a blue tone on these as well as the rest of the army but will only paint eight pointed stars and what not and use them with any mark I want, not just Tzeentch. Only the standard bearer is finished so far and you can see him below, hopefully I will have a nice unit of eight before the year is finished.

Wednesday, 26 March 2014

Imagine the nightmare of war where a multitude of undead and technologically advanced aliens are bearing down on you and your comrade. He takes a bullet to the chest, his writhing and screaming stops quickly as he bleeds out. All the time the aliens continue to advance, you blast what you can, but they keep coming. Eventually, they pass you unseen in your fox hole, you breathe a sign of relief and turn to pull the tags from your dead fox hole mate. You freeze in utter shock as you see the dead man rise, his dagger in his hand....he has been reanimated by the dark symmetry, as a mindless killing machine; an Undead Legionnaire. Will you join him in his eternal undeath?

I have started to copy the little introductions to each of the WZ:R models I finish for you guys who don't know what it is, and to get you into the right mood :)

Anyway, I have now finished the first five-man squad of Legionnaires and I liked how they turned out in the end. They where actually more difficult to paint than expected, but that has nothing to do with the actual model but rather that I was unsure about how to paint their armour.

At first I wanted to go with an individual look, so the Bauhaus guy would have the blue/grey colours but more worn and torn of course. In the end I instead went with a black armour but still worn down and rusted. This effect is something I'm rather new too so if anyone have any suggestions how to do this better, please let me know.

Monday, 24 March 2014

In the first year after their founding, the Venusian Rangers were deployed in the 23rd Lowlands sector where they sacked and destroyed the Citadel of the Nepharite Overlord Argonath. Since then, they have gone on to win countless battle honours in the name of Bauhaus and of Humanity as a whole.

My goal is to finish painting my Bauhaus starter as soon as possible but I just couldn't resist the temptations of painting up one of my absolute favourite troops in Warzone/Mutant Chronicles, the Venusian Rangers. This is a test model I painted up where I tried to do the classic white look on their armour. I painted it using Citadel Rakarth Flesh and then Highlight it with Citadel Pallid Wych flesh just leaving some Rakarth in the recesses. For a final highlight I painted it with pure white, in this case Ceramite White.

They will have a different look from the rest of the force, but I think that is just further showing how they are an elite infantry unit. As always all kinds of comments are much welcome. I will post up some more Warzone but from another faction soon.

Thursday, 20 March 2014

I know this review is a little late but here it goes. Second issue of Visions and maybe I like it better this time because this time we get a lot of Dwarf stuff, but other than that the formula stays the same. So on to the review.

Main release
The main topic this time around is much more interesting for me as a Dwarf player/collector. We get 59 pages of nice Dwarf miniatures, both lone models as well as pictures of whole armies and battles. The pictures is nice and all, but if you have all the WD Weekly with the Dwarf releases, the Army Book and maybe even the digital Dwarfs Painting Guide, I think you have already seen most of them. I think it was better pictures here than in the last issue, but I think this segment could be much more interesting because as I said, you have probably seen most of the pictures already.

If they mixed in some more colour schemes in here, banner designs, rune designs etc. It would have been much more interesting.

Forgeworld
Typhon and the his Terminators the Grave Wardens, some Iron Hands and some Vehicles. They all look nice but we have seen it before, eight pages.

Army of the Month
It features Damien Pedley's really large Imperial Guard army with some Grey Knights. Really nicely painted and some awesome conversions in there as well, the Death Cult Assassins and Inquisitor retinue is one of the coolest things in this Visions issue. Twenty pages, but it's all good. I just wished they had more text in there, but visions is all about the visual I guess.

Parade Ground
We get a lot of nice pictures from Golden Demon in Memphis, good mix of 40k and Fantasy on 52 Pages. One of the coolest is the Eldar Harlquins which won Gold in the 40k Squad Category.

Battle Report
Horned Rat Rising is this one called, and oh so cool it would have been if they continued and written a nice narrative about this battle. We don't get that though, just as the last one we get very little text. The little text we do get is about some things happening on the battlefield. No overview of the table and with the little text snippets we get we don't have any idea of what is really happening in the game. Suddenly we know which army won and that's it. Really disappointing, make me actual battle REPORT, this is just a lot of pictures taken from the same game.

Edit: When I took pictures for this review I also realised that the Battle Report is the same as in WD Weekly #3! Really strange, we get to few pictures in one of them (Wd Weekly) and no text in the other (Visions). So if you put those two together you actually get a real battle report instead, crazy. Why not just do a decent Battle Report and have it in the same magazine!

The same Battle Report in both Wd Weekly #3 and Visions #2 but in different styles. One lot of text and no pictures and one with almost no text but a lot of pictures, crazy.

Kit Bash
It's about Tau Battlesuits, I don't know that much about them but it seems there's isn't much conversion going on on the actual models, but rather on the bases which I find a little odd. Nice models though, 20 pages.

Blachitsu
It's like is usually is, we get to see another Inquisitorial Warband, this time by Mikael Silvanto. It looks nice but I think they could do something more with this articles. 6 pages.

Dark Eldar Kabals
Here they show us four different looking Dark Eldar armies, they look nice and they don't overdo it. 14 Pages

The Dwarf Throng
Here they show us the old miniatures in the Dwarfs range, in the same Eavy Metal colours we all have seen so many times before, don't understand the need for this segment/article at all.

Paint Splatter
Some easy and nice tips on how to paint the Dwarfs of course. The Dragon Slayer, Belegar, Dwarf Ironbreakers and Irondrakes, Longbeards and the Gyrobomber. They tips isn't bad but if you have the first three WD Weekly or the Dwarf Digital Painting Guide you already have these mini tutorials. A big let down for me who have all that already.

Upper picture; White Dwarf Weekly #3, Lower picture; Wh Visions: #2

Conclusion
So did this issue of Visions change my mind since the first one. In short, No. I did find this issue more interesting than the last, and I'm more accepting towards what they try to achieve with Visions. However I'm not accepting the fact that a lot of the stuff in this magazine is pictures and tutorials already found in other places (Edit: They even use the same Battle report!), be that in a Digital Painting Guide or WD Weekly. I still think there's to little text, especially for articles like the Battle Reports.Rating: 1,5

Monday, 17 March 2014

For a woman of such young age and understated beauty one may be forgiven for underestimating Angelika's military credentials and battlefield prowess. Drachen though will not forgive you or you military inabilities, no matter your rank, sex or age. If you are the General of a Bauhaus force and you are failing you will pay and pay quickly with a bullet to the head, your forces will then move on to many great successes and honours. You will be quicly forgotten. They and she will not!

That text was taken from the Warzone: Ressurection site and I thought it was nice to have some sorts of introduction to this woman, which is the commander and lord model in the Bauhaus Starter set for WZ:R. I haven't seen her in the Mutant Chronicles universe before so I think it's a new character.

As a model I like it for it's simplicity, you get the head I used and another helmeted version which is probably much easier to paint. However I wanted to try to paint a woman's face, because I haven't done that in years and is something I don't think I'm particularly good at. This one turned out okey I think, it's a hard model to paint because the details is so tiny, and many of them I didn't even see or recognise what it where until I looked at her artwork in the Rulebook.

And down below you can see how my Bauhaus force is looking right now, in the pipeline is a test model for my Venusian Rangers and five more Hussars to complete my Bauhaus Starter set.

Sunday, 16 March 2014

I usually don't post other peoples youtube videos but this one actually relates to me and this blog a little. The clip is one of many that TheSustainableCenter does and this one is part of his Empire Army Book review. All of them is really nice and I do recommend all of them so go an visit his channel check some of his more than 300 video clips.

Oh and why does this particular one relate to me then? Well he uses a picture of my War Altar of Morr during the review of the Arch Lector. Really surprising to see it there, and flattering.

Tuesday, 11 March 2014

This is my second Dwarf painting tutorial (first is how to paint a Dwarf Warrior and can be found here) and on this new Hammerer model I went with a colour scheme that is a little unusual on Dwarfs, but seen more and more in the latest Army Book for example. And that is coloured armour plates, usually Dwarfs have different kind of metals on their armour, like, steel, bronze, copper, silver, gold etc. On this model that is still there but I also added quite a bit of red armour to give this unit a more special look.

I even came up with an little explanation for it, or fluff even. And that is that this hammerer unit is the royal guard of Belagar Ironhammer and is called the Red Guard. They colour their armour because of all the blood their ancestors have spilt during all the battles and wars fought in Karak Eight Peaks. Or something like that, writing fluff isn't my cup of tea, so if anyone will help me with that feel free to do a comment below.

Anyway enough of this and on to the actual tutorial.

Step 1: Undercoating

Colours used: Army Painters Gun Metal Primer

I used Army Painters Gun Metal and sprayed it on, really easy and nice result. Be careful though as AP s Spray Primers don't work like GWs for example. Read the instructions closely!

Here I paint on all the main colours on the model, I think the picture shows where all the colours go, but I use Warplock Bronze for the scale mail and Balthasar Gold for the details that will be in gold. Bugmans glow is the base colour for the skin parts in the models face and parts of the arms, and Balor Brown is for the beard. Here you can use pretty much any other (that works for beards of course) colour if you want, but I will go for a dark blonde look here (Other colours I often use for beards are Skrag Brown for a reddish brown look, Mechanicus Standard Grey, Rakarth Flesh for a white beard etc.).

A final thing to do in this step before shading is to paint the scale mail with Brass Scorpion, I did this by carefullt drybrush it so I leave a little of Warplock Bronze in some of the recesses. Sorry that I don't show this in the picture above, but you will see the result after shading in the next step.

Step 3: Shading

Colours used: Army Painter (Warpaints) Dark Tone and Strong Tone.

I first wash all the metal parts with Dark Tone, but not the gold and bronze. When the first ink is dry I wash the hammer handle, beard and red parts of the armour and the bronze parts with Strong Tone. The skin you can leave if you want to or wash with the Strong Tone ink, in this case this was easier.

In this step you re apply the base colours again but you leave the shading where it should be, like in the recesses. There are some exceptions here though, the metal parts is highlighted with a lighter metal colour in this case Plate Mail Metal. The gold is highlighted with WP Greedy Gold

I make one more HL, Pure red on the edges of the red parts as well as the lower quarter of the ruby's. The flesh is highlighted with Cadian fleshtone and the beard are highlighted with Balor Brown with a little Rakarth Flesh mixed in (something like 75/25 mix). I also do the last wash in this step and that is Riekland Fleshshade on the gold areas, this makes it a little more red. When dry you can HL with Gold again before the next step but it isn't necessary (I didn't in this tutorial).

Now I do the final Highlights, Orange on the edges of the red armour and in the bottom of the ruby's, in the opposite corner of the ruby I first paint it black and then a white dot on the top of the stone in the black area. On all metal parts, bronze parts and gold I now do a fine edge highlight with Shining Silver. For last I paint the eyes and makes the base and the miniature is completed.

Monday, 10 March 2014

Well actually it's even the first of the new dwarf models that is finished, and I choose a Dwarf hammerer because I have to start somwhere and I will paint up 19 more in the first batch and then probably 10 more. So I wanted to to know how I will paint them, and as my army is is mainly red and black I of course wanted to incorporate these colours here as well.

It turned out I choose mainly red though as I wanted to try to paint Dwarfs in colours they aren't seen in that often, so I present you the first of hammerer of my Red Guard, protecting their lord and king Belegar Ironhammer.

I'm not totally sure on the theme yet so any suggestions or comments are very much welcome. One thing is sure though, I will post a tutorial on how I painted this guy very soon.

Sunday, 9 March 2014

I took a little break from my Bauhaus force and wanted to paint something else from my now quite big Warzone: Ressurection collection. I have always liked the look of Razides in Mutant Chronicles and they are totally different to paint from my Bauhaus troops so I went with that.

It was really easy to paint up, and could be done several highlights ago but it's a model that you just want to add some paint all the time. In the end I'm really happy with how it turned out and I hope Prodos makes more Razide sculpts soon because I want several more of them!

That's all for now, hope you like. And if you don't know anything about Warzone: Ressurection check out Prodos Games website here and look at beautiful miniatures in an awesome setting.

Friday, 7 March 2014

I have made a serious re-painting of my old 6th (I think) metal Grudge Thrower to fit into the rest of my Dwarfs army. Currently painting a lot of different things among them the first of the new Hammerer model which I will also will use for an upcoming painting tutorial. Anyhow here's my Grudge Thrower, hope you like.

Wednesday, 5 March 2014

This issue was much anticipated for all 40k fans and we had a lot of rumours going on about this weeks release. So on with the review:

New Releases

There's not many things out this week but one big and much anticipated kit, the Imperial Knight. These huge war machines are what this issue is all about and we get to see much about how the model looks in both Paladin and Errant versions and with different colour schemes and heraldry. Two pages is just to show you the transfers and some info what is what. It all looks nice and it really makes me wanting one more (not now though I have plenty to paint already)

We also get some info about the latest book releases among them a printed version of Sentinels of Terra and a digital version of Legion of the Damned codex.

Imperial Knights
Jervis Johnson explains the history of the Imperial Knights and what they are. Jes Godwin also talks about the design progress and we get a little picture of the first concept art for them back in the late 1980s and modern one, really cool to see how it have evolved. We also get some bits of fluff about the Knightly houses who have these huge war machines.

Paint Splatter
We get some basic techniques used on the Knights shown like Gold Trim, Blue armour, red armour, green eye lenses etc. We also get a little bigger tutorial on how they painted the black/yellow/white chevrons on one of the Knights. Nothing advanced but helpful nonetheless.

Spues and GlueWe get some useful tips on how to build these quite large miniatures. Nice if you are going put one together one day.

The Rules
We get the rules for the Knight Paladin and the Knight Errant, we get the opinions from Dan Harden and Adam Troke about how to best use them in battle along with some tips. This is still an nice segment in the magazine and especially interesting for us who won't buy the Imperial Knights codex anytime soon but still want to know the rules for them.

This week in White Dwarf
Adam speaks to Dale Springer and Tom Walton who designed the new Imperial Knight kit, and we also get some words from Mat Ward about his Codex Supplemtent Sentinels of Terra. We also get all those nice little bits and bobs like Bit of the Week (Seagull from Lothern Skycutter), Readers model of the week (Shaun Davies Chimera) and more stuff. Nice, short and simple.

Hobby in the White Dwarf Bunker
This about what the team do hobby wise in the bunker of course, this time we see Dan's Ork Warbikes, Matt's Slayers and Adams Genestealers.

Conclusion
I liked it this week as well, short and simple but everything pretty much is worth a read even for me who normally are sickened tired of 40k at the moment (and it made me want a Imperial Knight even more! ). So all and all, nice.

About me

I'm a 30 year old gamer of all kinds from Sweden. I've been in the hobby since 98-99 and when it comes to wargaming I'm mostly into the painting/converting part. This is mostly due the fact that my friends interest in the hobby has waxed and waned from time to time and I haven't been able to play as much as I would have liked.
I'm now also a father to two wonderful little girls so the the hobby time is sparse at best. But I try my best anyway to play games, paint and write posts on my blog and I hope you enjoy your stay here :)